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Empress
Ceciliane Martineau appears a youthful and fragile sixteen years old, due to a potion that her court alchemists have created for her. She is actually over sixty years old -- this potion may play a part in her insanity. She has porcelain, almost translucent skin, thin white hair and wears a simple white dress. In this sense she does look rather ghostly. Sometimes The Iron Empress, no one has really ever seen her. She has a palace in every major city, and she teleports randomly among them and never comes outside. There is a popular theory that she doesn't even exist at all, but is a fictional entity developed by a group of ambitious men. In reality she is rather young, very frail, and completely out of her mind. It's her closest adviser who interprets her whisperings and visions, and it is he who gives orders on her behalf. There is only a small group who ever sees the Empress herself, and all of them are required to wear masks at all times so that their expressions might not betray her and so that none of them might be recognized outside her presence. The Empress, at al times, wears a strange gold-colored amulet that sticks to her skin and bears odd symbols. One of her most prized asassins, returning from a mission in the East, brought it back and gave it to her as a gift. From this point it is said that this amulet is the major cause of her madness: it has been imbued with strange, almost-alien magic that can not be unwound by even the most powerful of her sages or magic-weilding underlings. Little does anyone know that the amulet she wears actually belongs to a mysterious, unknown Huli-Jing: the evasive, enigmatic fox-spirits of the East's forests. Because the Empress is not the rightful owner of the amulet, it drives her to insanity with its metaphysical connections to the otherworlds. She uses it to listen to the whispers of the Dragons who had created the Grimmalibrus, but its power is too much for her to contain. Little does she know that the true owner is seeking it with a taste for revenge... Ceciliane Martineau When Ceciliane was born in the tiny village of Echo, deep in a valley surrounded by mountains, she wasn't expected to live through the night. The baby was deathly pale, thin as straw, with bright blue eyes and spindly black hair. But survive she did, although in consistently poor health, always in need of excess care and watchful eyes. The child grew into a pretty youth of fifteen, with porcelain skin and shining black hair; her blue eyes of childhood had turned a muddy brown. She was consistently in poor health, thin and frail, and she could never eat very much at once without bringing it up again. She couldn't work very hard or very long without fainting, although she tried as well as she might, and the summer sun caused such painful burns and blisters that she was forced indoors on those sunny days. She took to sleeping through the day and wandering the countryside at night, if only to avoid the sun and the disappointed eyes and the reprimand from the villagers for her uselessness. Every twenty years, the village presented a sacrifice to the god of the valley, which was believed to inhabit a cavern that gaped between the crags upstream on the river. It was only through this sacrifice, the elders assured, that Echo enjoyed such prosperity and lush fields, and without it they would be destroyed. It was Ceciliane who was given to the mouth of the cave after a days-long ritual -- and when the bright robes and drums and plumes disappeared in the mists of the river, she was alone. Ceciliane, resigned to her fate, followed the whispers that wavered deep in the cavern, barefoot and quiet. She didn't know how long she wandered the black labyrinth that echoed with the sounds of breathing, of ticking clocks and clinking gears, her thin fingers following the wall while the bottom of her white dress grew heavy with dampness. She was unafraid, even as a chill like cold hands enveloped her. And then, echoing behind her, came the cries of a voice she recognized well. "Ceci!" he called frantically into the darkness. It was Roun, a young man who was loved and hailed by the village as their greatest blessing. She had always politely admired him from a distance, had never thought that the way he looked at her and spoke to her were any different than the way he behaved toward everyone else. But here he was, sword in-hand and frightened, plunging into the caverns with the unyielding mission to rescue her from her fate and run away with her, never to look back. "Ceci!" came that urgent call again, so filled with hope and determination, that Cecilianne's heart beat faster, and she pulled away from the grasping hands and called his name. When the howl of the Wolves echoes through the valley, the village rejoices, for the god had accepted their sacrifice. And it was the Wolves whose voices filled the cavern and the valley now, terrible howls that chilled her blood. "Roun!" she screamed again, but there was no answer. Just the black silence of the cavern. The Wolves had chosen their sacrifice -- or maybe she had chosen it for them, by wishing for that moment to live while Roun was willing to sacrifice himself to save her. For hours she cried, lost in the labyrinth, until she felt something brush against her. The Wolves had come to her, but didn't reply when she demanded Roun to be returned. Eventually she took comfort in their presence and lived with them there in the darkness. They whispered to her and she learned to understand them, understand their hatred. They were bound to this land, condemned to pour their life into the valley, kept alive only by one sacrifice every twenty years. They yearned for more, but could not escape the cavern, bound there long ago by a wizard after they had terrorized the countryside. Numb to the consequences, Cecilianne agreed to release them from their curse. Through a spell and a ritual they taught her, she destroyed the lock placed deep within the cave -- but the Wolves, trapped and starved for centuries, were too weak to leave the residual barrier for more than a few moments at a time, for they would be pulled back into the cavern when the strain of being away from it grew too great. So, in exchange for a promise, the Wolves gave her the power to summon them so that she might feed them and encourage their strength, and released her from the cave. Ceciliane asked the Wolves to continue lending their power to the valley, and also that they would no longer ask sacrifices of the village, but would let it enjoy its prosperity as it always had, would protect it. The Wolves agreed. The first time she summoned them outside the cavern, they took the old tax collector who had been lining his pockets with the village's money, and Cecilianne was pleased. Encouraged by this new power, Ceciliane went on to conquer first anyone she had been led to believe was corrupted, and then to make demands and flaunt her cool dominance over a quickly expanding legion of followers. To those closest to her she created bronze masks, which she enchanted with the same ability to summon the Wolves. But the Wolves were steadfastedly loyal to Ceciliane, and obeyed the Grima's wishes as long as she permitted it -- otherwise, when the disloyal Grima -- or anyone who tried to use a mask who was not its rightful given owner -- opened the channel to the Wolves' cavern, they devoured him instead. For as long as the Wolves were loyal to Ceciliane, they knew she would continue to feed them a steady stream of sacrifices, both through her own wishes and through her Grima. In hopes of earning the possession of the Grima's mask and the Empress' favor, her followers grew quickly. Soon she had the loyalty of politicians, whose enemies she happily destroyed for them in exchange for more power. While these selected politicians took power and old kings mysteriously disappeared among the howling Wolves, while the lands were thrown into chaos, Ceciliane was forced to go into hiding, with her Grima by her side, to escape the constant threats on her life by loyalists of the old kings and those who feared they would be next to be taken. Although her methods were cruel, Cecilianne, now called and hailed as simply the Empress, ruled with a desire for peace and prosperity as well as a childish need for everyone she ruled to love her. She set the Wolves on rulers she came to know were being unjust to the people, and put in their place new kings who would encourage trade and use taxes to improve the lives of the people. As the trend continued, current corrupt rulers shut themselves away and ruled from the sidelines -- for even Cecilianne couldn't set the Wolves upon someone if she didn't know where they were at a given moment. Wars and propaganda broke out as these kings fought to keep their kingdoms and the Empress was forced to conquer through force -- but the wars never lasted long and there was indeed peace and prosperity in their wake. Eventually Ceciliane had no more need to summon the Wolves herself, for the Grima were more than happy to set them on her enemies for her, and her loyal kings and armies ruled and fought on her behalf. She only summoned the Wolves to take the life of a Grima who displeased her, and they obeyed, and the mask was destroyed -- but a Grima who killed another Grima or tried to set the Wolves on another Grima were sacrificed, themselves. But only those Cecilianne viewed to have kind hearts and honorable souls received those precious masks. And then, one of her most trusted Grima, whom she cared for, returned from the East with a pretty amulet. She wore it and refused to remove it from her throat for even a moment, for it was instantly very precious to her. She began to hear whispers again -- different voices that bled together, visions of trees and flowers, of events that had happened long ago or might yet come to pass. She was confused by the appearance of a glorious, peaceful land, of Dragons and strange foxes. When she spoke it was in cryptic words, and she gave orders without knowing what they meant. Eventually the Grima realized her mind had gone, and she no longer summoned the Wolves herself for any reason, or really knew what was going on. Trapped by the masks and afraid of the Empress' wrath, the Grima obeyed, guided by one of their own who served to translate the Empress' words into commands. Because this man was not struck down, they were led to believe he spoke the truth, and carried out the Empress' wishes, releasing the Wolves with greater ferocity, sending the land into chaos and depression and war as it was sucked dry. And all the while, the Wolves were growing stronger...